The Negative Form

Photogram Exhibition at Ropes & Twines, Liverpool, UK

The Negative Form

Fielding through cymatics, photography and tinnitus, Lola de la Mata presents works as artifacts of the invisible as artifacts of the invisible. Each photogram captures prototype instruments or tools used in the creation of the conceptual album ‘Oceans on Azimuth’.

Emerging from the depths of the cochlea, the prints draw on reveries of a submerged world. Here, the sculptural forms are reminiscent of bone, membrane or tissue found in the middle and inner ear.

To create the one-off prints, Lola worked in the darkroom with objects directly onto photographic paper. Upon shining light down onto its surface, the silver in the paper draws together creating pools of darkness while the white of the photographs, a negative trace of the light filtering through air, dust and glass, is an inactive or dormant echo of the process.

Much like with sonic lab experiments, these photographic experiments are created working with the invisible. Through the development process, the framed works reveal the presence of the maker and traces of to-scale three dimensional forms moving above the paper surface. It is perhaps uncanny to interpret the final images as recalling cellular forms one might observe under a microscope.